Is this the Pixel Qi Google Chromebook for long battery life and outdoor usability? 12.85" 2560x1700 resolution touch screen? ARM Cortex-A15 preferably big.LITTLE, is this a Texas Instruments OMAP5 powered or does Samsung provide Google with an Octa Exynos5 for Chromebook already?

What do you think the price is going to be? My guess is $100 for non-touch non-Retina version and $200 for touch Retina version. The goal to basically make the ARM Powered Chrome OS the number 1 OS for laptops/desktops worldwide.

Chrome OS can’t do anything that Linux can other than Browse the web. No terminal no real way to install games no real way to compile source code. Sure you can play web games but that’s about it but put Linux on these laptops and you got a powerful machine that play many games.

Cheaper, faster. thinner, lighter, cheaper, more secure, shorter boot time, easier to synchronize and auto-update, safer to auto-secure auto-update accross all manufacturers, easier to mass manage centrally and generally, HTML5 web apps can run all native code, 3D, you can also do all programming, compilation if needed (remotely), also in theory you can run any other app on the web, and all web apps can run offline cached and installed updated as any native app on any other Linux or other Operating System.

Jml

Yeah nice feature list however its useless if can’t do very much. Chrome OS is limited you can’t run Linux games on it for example and no terminal or development tools to compile games that are only in source code format make Chrome OS useless for me.

Enrico Zagnoli

you are sooo wrong…

with high-res touchscreen display, backlit keyboard, alluminium case, etc… it won’t be under 800$ i guess

Backlit keyboard, aluminium costs nothing. High-resolution touch screen costs little more than normal touch screen if Google invests the required money to mass manufacture the new type of screen, and when Google does that, I think Pixel Qi makes sense. And ARM Powered laptop costs $100 to make, thus $200 can be the price when adding few new things like high resolution touch feature. Google makes upwards more than $100 per year on Chrome users, thus if they are sure the laptop is great and that users probably will use it as their main laptop for more than 2 years, then it’s a great profitable business for them.

You can run Linux games on Chrome OS. And you can do programming on Chrome OS. It’s all a question of software being done on HTML5 using all the native code, WebGL and other advanced features of HTML5 for offline web app acceleration and caching, and it’s only a question of web services provided, streamed, hosted, provided. In theory you can run all the same advanced games on Chrome OS, in theory you can do all the most advanced professional things on Chrome OS, including all types of video editing, photo editing, 3D rendering, and any advanced software programming. In fact with the right online/offline programming tools on Chrome OS, you can have instant code tests throughout all platforms, using cloud based code development and testing services, which actually thus are better than any native local compilation you’d want to do.

Jml

In theory not in reality Chrome OS can run lots of programs but they are web programs that you can run on any other OS as well. The cloud is dumb and foolish because your giving your data and personal info to someone else. I like a more standalone OS like Linux. I would rather not have the OS I am using be linked to my Google Mail. But Chrome OS itself can’t do diddly squat other than run a web browser and web apps and games that you can run on any OS with a decent Web Browser. Still web games is a nice Idea but the cloud has been dead right from the start because it didn’t take off.

All other OS cannot be mass managed, thus the other OS are too complicated, cannot automatically get updates, thus cannot remain fully secure, cannot be as small and optimized as Chrome OS, Chrome OS is designed to be the smallest possible thus most optimized possible operating system for an ARM Powered laptop. You can always try to run Ubuntu, Fedora or other on an ARM Powered Chromebook, but the schools, the enterprise, the mass market that wants a laptop, those people cannot mess with that. Those other “more fully featured” Linux OSes have far too many things that 99% of people do not need, those are bloated bloatware OS, yup even Ubuntu and Fedora are bloatware. Not as unsafe as Windows of course, but not usable for the mass market, those are only for very specialized use. And again, Chrome OS and HTML5 allows for more and more of the specialized professional features can be run much better using the cloud. And the cloud is huge, cloud computing dominates 99% of all the things every laptop user does today. The future is only more about cloud computing.

Jml

Chrome OS is easy to manage and use but is useless for anyone like me who wants to play games that are not prepackaged in a nice box for Chrome OS It is as limited as Android and iOS. I am the 1% not the 99%. The cloud never took off because people didn’t want their personal info in other peoples hands that whats I heard anyway. Linux is so much better for my uses than Chrome OS. Chrome OS can’t run cave story or any emulators nor can it run several dozen Linux games that I might want to play.

Nvidia grid is one of the ways you’ll be able to run any advanced games on Chrome OS.. Also WebGL 3D acceleration and native code in the HTML5 of Chrome OS is why all future games are going to be HTML5 compatible.

Jml

Not bad I suppose but it might cost too much. You naive to think that all future games are going to be HTML5 compatible. HTML5 is a starting out it is not refined just yet.

ddevine

DO WANT!

Marc Guillot

You will be able to put Ubuntu in it (there is already an Ubuntu setup for the recent Samsung ARM ChromeBook).

Like you say, switching to Ubuntu would be the first think I would do on an ARM ChromeBook.

Jml

I just hope that there will be 3D HW Acceleration on the Chromebook in Ubuntu.

yellowdroid

Ha Ha, you said $200. I like how you are always way off base in terms of pricing. Big pipe dream with lot of conjecture.. What do you say now that is is $1300.

That’s just the difference betwee Google choosing to do ARM mass market Pixel Qi (making and selling 10+ millions within few month) and them making the wrong decision to use Intel and a standard LCD and only planning to sell few 10s of thousands as somekind of overpriced reference design because Intel CEO is still on Google board of directors. Google may still do thr much better value ARM one as soon as they can get an ARM Cortex-A15 processor.